


Skin deep (a heart that pumps diseased blood through a walking corpse)

by EliolovesOliver



Series: SLOWBURN? MORE LIKE SLOWLEARN TO LOVE YOURSELF AMMIRITE!?! [8]
Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Bad Parents, F/M, Favouritism, Gen, Im not hating on dick its just how it is, Jays one sided crush on roy and kori, Lots of backstory, M/M, Mentioned violence, Multi, Referenced depression, Suicide Attempts, but not of jason, good parents, horrible family dynamics, introspective i guess, jay is pouting, lots of guilt and selfblame, minor dissociation reference, referenced emotional and psychological abuse, roy and kori are together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-24
Updated: 2019-10-24
Packaged: 2021-01-02 02:16:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21153929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EliolovesOliver/pseuds/EliolovesOliver
Summary: Jason could have stopped it all from spiralling this far.





	Skin deep (a heart that pumps diseased blood through a walking corpse)

See now, Jason Peter Todd Wayne was not a good person. Never had been and had accepted it as a shitty little brat with a tire iron and an empty stomach. But so was everyone else, literally every human being on Earth was bad, no good and rotten on the inside. 

But that's not the point.

No, the point is that Jason could have done something, could have helped. He'd gone through depression and knew the signs intimately but he'd been too busy feeling sorry for himself that he let Timmy down.

He'd known his brother needed help but had sat back and watched as life slowly drained itself from Timmy, until he eventually started helping it along.

(He stopped eating, stopped sleeping, surviving on coffee and energy drinks, walked into traffic without a care for the cars around him, traipsing around on tall buildings and just fucking sitting there staring into nothingness-)

So, why you ask? Why had Jason just allowed such destructive behaviour?

Who the fuck really knows.

\----------------------------

Maybe it started when he met Bruce, a giant beast of a man, completely unaffected by getting a tire iron to the arm, seemingly amused by it, worried more about Jason's tiny stature than the wheels that had been boosted.

(Bruce who had come home one day with a brand new child, haunted by the abduction and murder and hospitals (and those horrible, neglectful, borderline abusive parents he had) he had to suffer through with his parents, claiming the creepy kid needed a place to stay for a little while (Bruce already had adoption papers on his desk in his study, not that Jason was gonna tell him he knew about them). And so it began, and Jason could do nothing as Tim impressed Bruce at every turn (with his amazing photography skills, his sharp intellect, his negotiation skills, his computer smarts that was almost as good as Babs' and his- everything).).

\----------------------------

It was also probably about the ass called Dick who was more of a pussy than anything else.

Because Dick had hated him at first-  
"You're not my brother. You're just street trash that Bruce- that my dad- felt sorry for."

(But with Tim- Dick was that awesome big brother that Jason was only just getting to see.

"Tim! C'mon little bro, I'm driving you to school today!"

Maybe it was his own fault for wanting to be homeschooled.  
(But the thought of what those rich brats would say about him- he got enough of that shit from the media, he didn't need it from snot nosed brats with a bunch of racist, fascist, homophobic- just complete assholes, basically- for parents.)

But that didn't count for shit in Timmy's case. It was a bit delayed but Dick had let him down too.)

\----------------------------

(It definitely had nothing to do with Alfred, who'd given him his first book, who'd taught him German and French, who'd taught Jason to fend for himself, how to cook, how to keep things tidy, how sew and stitch and mend and fix. Alfred who had seen his jealousy and loneliness and kept him company and encouraged him to warm up to Tim. It wasn't Alfred.)

\----------------------------

Maybe Tim himself had something to do with it.

Tim with his perfectly adorable mini Bruceness, his Wayne level handsomeness, his perfection in everything he did (that had been instilled by his parents, hoping they'd love him if he was perfect-  
"Why!? Why was I never good enough?! I should have been better for them, why wasn't I better, Jay? I just wanted- they just wanted me to be... and now I'll never see them again. And I'll never be what they wanted. I'll never be good enough.")

(Timmy who hadn't had a haircut in a while, who ate stale pizza and burped in Jason's face, Timmy who cried himself to sleep watching dudes being bros in anime because  
"The power of their friendship and love for one another is so driven and well executed Jay!"

(Not that Jason had any room to judge. He still teared up thinking about Hide.))

\----------------------------

Or maybe it was just always going to happen. His bio mom made contact and he was in a bad place, so he ran off. (Nearly got himself killed 'cos his mom fucking sold him to a psycho-)

And he hadn't mentioned it to anyone. Whoops.

But as he was turning his back on everything (th Wayne's, his mom, Gotham in all her creepy dank glory) he was met with Talia al Ghul. So he just kind of tagged along with her on her world travelling business (because she was a smart, independent (complete bitch (that he loved to bits) woman). Eventually he took his leave from her and just played tourist to a few beautiful (if a bit cult like and nudist friendly) countries and tribes. That's where he met Princess Koriand'r of Tamaran and became reacquainted with Roy Harper. (Jay only wished it had been more intimate but Roy had only had eyes for Kori and vice versa. On the bright side they were now in both stationed in Gotham, Kori shedding the outdated tribal life and Roy- well Roy just did whatever he wanted.)

So he'd come back. And Bruce was missing.

(Had drunk himself into a stupor in his grief of the missing Jason, who'd been gone for about three years at that time.)

That left Alfred and Dick to take care of Timmy (and Damian, who in all those years with Talia had never come up in conversation and didn't that sting a bit? The fact that he'd opened up to her about all his secrets and insecurities and she couldn't be bothered to tell him he had a brother. Now he understood why Bruce had described there relationship as "Butterflies in my stomach, but their wings are poisonous.")

And Alfie had been grieving, he'd lost his grandson and then his son went missing as well. Then he found out he had another grandson to care for. He'd probably forced himself to pretend he was fine for the kids' sake and Jason couldn't fault him for having to keep up with Dicks mood swings and Damians murderous tendencies (which were not limited to but rather concentrated on Tim.)

But Jason hadn't seen that. He hadn't seen Damian stabbing Tim ("They had to remove my spleen! For the love of God Dick, that is not a cry for help, it's fraticide!" "It would only be fratacide if you were my brother!")

He hadn't seen Dicks blatant favoritism ("Calm down Tim, he's just a kid and you're overreacting! Maybe you shouldn't have antagonising him when he was clearly upset!" "I ASKED HIM TO PASS THE BUTTER YOU ABSOLUTE ASS!").

But he had seen Tim's depression. The dark circles under his eyes, the staring into thin air the fact that he had no friends and spoke to no one. But he ignored it and left to live with Roy and Kori in their apartment (because he was a sadist and a masochist and seeing the two people he was in lo- had the hots for in such intimate proximity was just the kind of torture he needed). All because he was thinking with his Richard John Grayson Wayne and not his Timothy Jackson Drake Wayne ( 'cause Timmy was the smartest by far so of course he'd be the brain).

And then Bruce was found and he guilt tripped Jason into coming back and convinced Dick to stay for Damians sake (and Timmy got himself emancipated and there was still a small disconnect whenever he and Dick spoke because "You were right. Damian is a child and he didn't know better so it's our responsibility to teach him right from wrong. But you didn't do that, you just wanted him to be happy so you let him do whatever he wanted, you let him walk all over me, let him get away with almost killing me- just because you wanted him to like you.")

And then Jason had this amazing idea to put pink hair dye in Timmy's shampoo. Thank god he'd ignored the angel on his shoulder because if he hadn't, if he had allowed himself to think he was above such childish bullshit- his little brother would have bled out with tears in his eyes and that loneliness Jay still struggled with sometimes.

Maybe being a good person wasn't everyone's best choice given the hand they were dealt. (Jason ignored the part of him whispering that if he'd been a good person the first time, when he'd noticed the signs, he could have prevented it from spiralling that far in the first place.)


End file.
